Rebecca MacKinnon's postings about work, reading, and ideas from 2004-2011.

January 17, 2006

China's Big Bro and Sis now have names and faces!

Meet "Jingjing" and "Chacha"- your friendly Chinese internet police!

Seriously, this is not a joke. These cartoon web cops named "JIngjing" and "Chacha" (the word "jing cha" means "police" in Chinese) will apparently be patrolling websites originating in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen.

Starting today, when netizens
visit all the main portals of Shenzhen city, Guangdong, they will see
two cartoon figures "Jingjing" and "Chacha" (Jing Cha = Police).
The image of Shenzhen Internet Police will officially be online. From
now on, when netizens visit websites and web forums of Shenzhen, they
will see these two cartoon police images floating on their screen. Our
reporter learned that these are the images of Shenzhen Internet Police,
presented by Internet Surveillance Division of Shenzhen Public Security
Bureau, for the first time in China.

While the Jingjing and Chacha will be linked to instant messaging
accounts where netizens can get questions answered about internet security, their real purpose is
intimidation, authorities admit. According to the Public Security official interviewed by the Beijing Youth Daily, their real function is to remind internet users that the Chinese police are watching people online no differently than offliine. In other words: don't do anything online that you wouldn't do in a physical public place in China! The article continues:

"The main function of Jingjing
and Chacha is to intimidate, not to answer questions," our reporter was
told by officials in charge of The Internet Security and Surveillance
Division of Shenzhen Public Security Bureau. The Internet has been
always monitored by police, the significance of Jingjing and Chacha's
appearence is to publicly remind all netizens to be conscious of safe
and healthy use of the Internet, self-regulate their online behavior,
and maintain harmonious Internet order together.

While I don't wish to start a war over the idea, I'd like to remind Bobby to please refrain from politically-charged statements like "violent video game". It's only really "violent" to those who have trouble separating fantasy from reality.

Additionally, the version of the game the Army actually uses is substantially different from the released game - the physics are modified to make the gameplay more exciting, while the recruiting tool is significantly more realistic at the expense of gameplay. The game in its strictest sense is not the recruiting tool.

No matter how China may open to the world it is still a closed society. Foreigners are not welcomed and their extra-territorial ideas can not be acceptable to this truly ancient mind-set. Jingjing and his buddy could just as well be Boris and Natasha of the Bull-Winkle fame, they represent to the West a weird mindset and unfortunately probably our next world war enemy.